>Though two decades old, Foison’s brief success reveals the rot at the heart of the classical music industry, where name-dropping passes as a substitute for abi

>Though two decades old, Foison’s brief success reveals the rot at the heart of the classical music industry, where name-dropping passes as a substitute for ability; where many audiences would rather be coddled than challenged; and where a résumé is grounds for utter suspension of disbelief. It goes deeper than this. Modern audiences largely don't understand or appreciate the music as anything other than an excuse to break out the fancy clothes and have a night out. That's not a problem per se, but it does lead to things like complete hacks getting big as performers (Lang Lang) or composers (Max Richter). Because why would a modern audience watching Lang Lang on late night television understand that he's flubbing half the notes and stomping all over the quality of the music? It's very interesting to think back to the Rite of Spring and how the audience rioted over it, as audiences were quickly trained into eating shit and thanking the composer for it. Part of the death of modernity was that cultural expectations and norms ceased to be, and so the kind of cultural expectations (that were subverted) that Rite of Spring's audience held just don't exist anymore. Every piece is now the composer telling you something about themselves in particular, usually in an overly programmatic way, not a composer trying to write a compelling piece in a particular style. So once you lobotomize your audience, what do you expect? You train the critical aspect out of them, turn music appreciation into an academic affair so lofty that harsh critical statements like mine are viewed as "snobby" vs people saying "Nickelback sucks!" being treated as normal and reasonable. Poptimism came for the classical music world and had about the same effect as it did on the rock/indie scene.